Rural GTA turning into a suburb.

[cdl42]

That's just exurban growth, it's nothing new. I don't think anything was "discovered". Most small towns in Ontario have small subdivisions and developments built in the 70s, 80s, and 90s, just (as was pointed out) on a much, much smaller scale than in the suburbs.

It's just the pace which has changed as the city grows in both area and population.

 

[EnviroTO]

Scarborough was sprawl too when it was built. The only reason some people don't see Scarborough as sprawl is that something has now been built beyond it. To me sprawl is not a place but a sytle of land use with larger lots, larger ROWs, cul-de-sacs, and winding streets. If development would get back to thinner ROWs, sidewalks on every street, and grid pattern street layout that would save significant land and make neighbourhoods more transit friendly.

 

[Antiloop33rpm]

To me sprawl is not a place but a sytle of land use with larger lots, larger ROWs, cul-de-sacs, and winding streets.

Defining sprawl (or the attempt to) is also a good way to spark some debate.

Personally I see sprawl not so much in terms of land use, but in terms of energy and resource. Do you need to drive to function in it? How much fuel do you use to transport yourself and to heat your home? How much energy goes into building it? How much does it cost to maintain it? What resources are necessary just to stay healthy? What external support systems are needed to keep it functioning?

Take 3 different areas of the GTA, North York, Mississauga, and Scarborough. How would you classify these in terms of sprawl? There will probably be a rather wide range of opinions as too how and why people classify them.

Myself, I would probably say that while Mississauga has a built form that is identifiable with sprawl, it also has its own government and tends to look more inward to itself than too Toronto. As Mississauga grows it will make attempts to grow around its own center and develop its own econmic independence rather than just relying on being solely a dormitory of Toronto. Scarborough lies at the other end. It has some small nodes of activity and some economy, but it is still dependant on the central city for its existence. Basically it has a shopping mall. Lying somewhere in the middle is North York which may have some areas that are denser or more urban in nature than most suburbs, has some economic activity, but is still a secondary node to the central city and still functions under the governance of the central city.

Again, thats just my own point of view on the issue and everyone is going to see it differently.

Another defintion might also be "an area of one or two very limited uses and minimal systems of self support and sustainability."

 

[scarberiankhatru]

Don't shoot the messenger, but Mississauga is just Scarborough with an airport.

"The only reason some people don't see Scarborough as sprawl is that something has now been built beyond it. To me sprawl is not a place but a sytle of land use with larger lots, larger ROWs, cul-de-sacs, and winding streets."

There's varying degrees of sprawl - Aurora and Vaughan are both orders of magnitude sprawllier than Scarborough or Mississauga. Imagine how dispersed the sprawl will be when Vaughan is surrounded and no longer considered the height of sprawl.

 

[adma]

Not necessarily Aurora--after all, it's still centred around an "old town", and one not as forlorn or sideswiped as Old Markham. (Well, it still serves the purposes of a Stronachian ideal of small-town gentility...)

 

[scarberiankhatru]

The sprawl surrounding downtown Aurora (and its degree of forlornness relative to Markham is debatable...it's perhaps more integrated with the newer stuff (although anything pre-Mulroney might count as "Old Aurora"), which helps it lose the separate identity, for better or for worse, that Old Markham has) is some of the sprawlliest sprawl that ever sprawled and yet is still an order of magnitude better than Vaughan.